Reuters Rewrites History of Jerusalem

The Reuters News Agency, in a "fact box" history of Jerusalem, blurs the Jewish tradition in Jerusalem, emphasizes Muslim claims to the city and omits any mention that Arabs attacked Israel in 1947 and 1967. Reuters told its readers that Jerusalem "has been settled for 5,000 years." Omitting any mention of the purchase of the city by Kind David, as recorded in the Bible, the news agency states that Jerusalem "became the center of Jewish religion and nationhood." The only mention of the Holy Temple is that the Romans destroyed it.

Reuters dedicated three paragraphs on the Muslim claim to city, failing to note that the Koran does not mention the city even once.

The "fact box" also records the United Nations partition plan in 1947 but then omits any mention of the Arab refusal to accept the plan and its subsequent war against the new state. Instead, it told readers, "In fighting in 1948, Jewish forces took the western suburbs of Jerusalem and land linking it to the new Israeli state." In similar vein, Reuters did not mention that virtually every Arab neighbor staged attacks on Israel and instead wrote that "Israel and Arab states went to war again in 1967."